Monday, April 25, 2011

Obama's EPA working to raise gasoline prices - Arctic Alaska

Obama is preventing Shell Oil from producing oil in the far-north Beaufort Sea area of Alaska. Shell has spent $ billions to be able to start production. There is about 27 billion barrels of oil.

But Obama's EPA is concerned about air quality for people who live in the area. The nearest village of 245 people is 70 miles away. 70 miles!!

Raising gasoline prices requires a lot of obstruction of productive people. But Obama has his people hard at work. It must be a high priority.

Fox News: Energy in America

Shell Oil Company has announced it must scrap efforts to drill for oil this summer in the Arctic Ocean off the northern coast of Alaska. The decision comes following a ruling by the EPA’s Environmental Appeals Board to withhold critical air permits....

Shell has spent five years and nearly $4 billion dollars on plans to explore for oil in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. The leases alone cost $2.2 billion. Shell Vice President Pete Slaiby says obtaining similar air permits for a drilling operation in the Gulf of Mexico would take about 45 days. He’s especially frustrated over the appeal board’s suggestion that the Arctic drill would somehow be hazardous for the people who live in the area. “We think the issues were really not major,” Slaiby said, “and clearly not impactful for the communities we work in.”

The closest village to where Shell proposed to drill is Kaktovik, Alaska. It is one of the most remote places in the United States. According to the latest census, the population is 245 and nearly all of the residents are Alaska natives. The village, which is 1 square mile, sits right along the shores of the Beaufort Sea, 70 miles away from the proposed off-shore drill site.

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